Rivermen beat Heat in 2-1 shootout duel

Taylor Chorney put one where the AHL’s best goaltender wasn’t, and that helped put the Peoria Rivermen where they hadn’t been this season against the Abbotsford Heat. Chorney delivered a dramatic game-tying third-period goal while goaltender Mike McKenna weathered a 17-shot...

Taylor Chorney put one where the AHL’s best goaltender wasn’t, and that helped put the Peoria Rivermen where they hadn’t been this season against the Abbotsford Heat.

Chorney delivered a dramatic game-tying third-period goal while goaltender Mike McKenna weathered a 17-shot second period and stopped four of five penalty-shot challengers in a shootout tiebreaker Monday to give the Rivermen a 2-1 victory before 5,925 at Carver Arena.

It was the first time in three tries the Rivermen beat the powerful Heat, who rode the league’s best goaltender, Barry Brust, into the third period with a 1-0 lead.

Rivermen winger Phil McRae had a monster game, producing eight shots, and Peoria picked up shootout goals from McRae and Jaden Schwartz to beat Brust, who brought in a 1.40 goals-against and .948 saves rate to the game.

The Heat swamped McKenna with 17 shots in the second period and took a 1-0 lead on Krys Kolanos’ bad-angle shot from the left endline that popped in over McKenna’s glove shoulder.

But Peoria turned the tables for 18 shots in the third period and overtime, and had the Heat scrambling to hang on at the finish.

Chorney tied it at 7:35 of the third when the defenseman skated off the right boards and to the right circle faceoff dot, then fired a shot between Brust’s left pad and glove.

“Our team plays a grinding style, we wear teams down and we’re not going to score a lot of goals,” Chorney said. “To be honest, I am by no means a goal scorer. I’m not one of those guys who tries to pick a spot. But I knew I was close on him and I just tried to put it in a place where he wasn’t.”

McKenna shut the door the rest of the way.

“You have to be on your game, especially against someone like Brust,” McKenna said. “I’ve played against him a lot in this league and know what he can do. I never go into a game expecting it to be high scoring or low scoring. There’s always that abberation game, always one that blows up.

“But this one? Absolutely not.”

McKenna stopped center Max Reinhart on a breakaway at 14:19 of the second period.

The Rivermen then stepped on the gas in the third, led by McRae, whose hard-charging shifts prompted a line switch in which the team put him onto the top line with T.J. Hensick and Derek Nesbitt.

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That trio, along with Chorney, was on the ice for a four-on-three power play in sudden-death overtime, and all three were chosen in the shootout as well.

“I felt good,” McRae said. “We wanted to keep shooting and eventually get something through on (Brust). He played a good game over there. We knew we didn’t play our best game in the first two periods.

“But from the third period on we stepped it up and took it away.”

RIVER READINGS: Rivermen are 16-11-1 all-time on New Year’s Eve and have won 11 of their last 15 meetings on Dec. 31. ... Abbotsford goaltender Barry Brust set an AHL record earlier this season with a shutout sequence of 268 minutes, 17 seconds. He arrived with a strong history against the Rivermen, too, with a 5-1-0 career record against Peoria in the AHL, plus a 1.96 goals-against and .936 saves rate.

Dave Eminian covers the Rivermen for the Journal Star, Reach him at 686-3206 or deminian@pjstar.com. Follow him on Twitter @icetimecleve.